


Cakes and Compromise

by Ray_Writes



Series: Tumblr Prompts [33]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Wedding Planning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-26 01:19:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14989628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ray_Writes/pseuds/Ray_Writes
Summary: Planning a wedding can be tough when the groom's an alien.





	Cakes and Compromise

**Author's Note:**

> So yet another sentence prompt for an anonymous tumblr person! I think I have two more to do from the list I was given, then I can get to some of the other more general/scenario-based prompts (or maybe that WIP I keep meaning to update...). Please enjoy!

Donna was quite good at planning events. The fact that she’d already planned her own wedding once before certainly helped, but even without that previous experience, she was confident in her abilities there.

Her mum had hunted down the usual books and folders and promotions for this sort of thing with only minimal grumbling, which Donna suspected had a lot to do with the Doctor telling them not to worry about cost.

She’d been running everything by him, of course. Donna would have anyway — he was the bloody groom, after all — but she didn’t want him thinking they were taking advantage. Not that he ever seemed to spare a thought for money, but wedding bills had ruined plenty of marriages before. Plus it was the only way she could guarantee getting him involved.

He wasn’t  _ disinterested _ . He’d look at whatever she’d show him and largely defer to her judgment. Sometimes he asked a question here or there, but mostly out of curiosity more than anything else. Donna found herself wanting all this wedding business to be over and done with so that they could get back to traveling. At least she knew he liked that!

The one thing he seemed to be at all looking forward to was picking out the cake. He’d already asked if they could get one with edible ball bearings, and he even helped her decide on which bakery to go with. And that had given Donna pause.

Her fiancé liked to have a bit of fun, and while Donna loved that about him, the fact that he was so keen on cakes was worrisome. 

Her first go-around through this, she’d never quite been able to extract a promise from Lance; he’d always give some vague answer about wanting it to be a surprise. Now she knew he’d probably been relishing the opportunity to humiliate her and get away with it before murdering her horribly.

The Doctor would never do that to her, at the least not on purpose, but it was also possible that he would see it all as just a laugh. Donna was not at all interested in being laughed at on her wedding day. So there was one thing she knew she had to make absolutely clear.

"If you shove cake in my face, I promise you this will be the worst wedding night of your life.”

Across the kitchen table from her, she watched the Doctor’s face scrunch up. “Why would I do that?”

“Well, you know. It’s sort of a tradition,” she remarked with a roll of her eyes.

“Is it?”

Donna had a moment of regret that she’d apparently reminded him — but then it hit her. “You really wouldn’t know, would you?”

“When did that start up?” He was too busy wondering to reply. “Is it a Three Stooges homage?”

How could she have been so  _ stupid _ ? Of course he wasn’t all that invested; this wasn’t a wedding to him. He’d thought her dress would have pockets!

Donna looked down at the books and stationary samples spread out across the table with a newfound sense of despair.

“Forget it,” she decided. “Forget the whole thing.”

“What?”

She flipped the nearest book closed and pushed it away from her. “We’re not doing this.”

“The wedding? Donna, you’ve wanted to get married since the day I met you,” he reasoned. “This means a lot to you.”

“But none of it means anything to you! Here I am going on to you about flower arrangements and what order to do the speeches in, and I never even asked you if there was something you wanted to add from your people’s wedding ceremonies.”

“Oh.” He was quiet for a moment.

“Is there something you’d want to do?” She asked quietly. “That we could do?”

“Not without confusing most of the guests,” the Doctor admitted. “Look, Donna, I didn’t go into this expecting Gallifreyan customs to be incorporated into the ceremony. I didn’t even bring it up. You don’t have to feel badly for not thinking of it.”

“But I want this to be for both of us, to represent who we are as people and as a couple,” she insisted. “Hang the guests, I’m marrying an alien. Do you think I’m bothered if they’re confused?”

He smiled, eyes crinkling at the corners. “No. Right then, a human-Time Lord wedding.”

Donna felt herself brightening again and reached across the table for a notebook that she flipped open to a fresh page. The Doctor made an amused noise in the back of his throat.

“When you’re ready,” she told him primly.

“Well, I’m trying to think of what we  _ can _ do. The full version of the ceremony is rather long.”

“How long?”

He gave her a look. “We had all the time in the universe.”

Donna nodded. “Okay. So maybe just a shorter portion of that ceremony.”

“Well, there was a shorter version. The battlefield version. But this isn’t exactly a battle, and I don’t really feel like asking your mum to let me marry you.”

“What’s that?”

“The shorter ceremony mostly consists of asking the parents of the intendeds to ‘consent and gladly give’ their children,” he explained. “I having no parents and you only having your mother, it doesn’t exactly work.”

Donna snorted. “Yeah, you’re gonna be waiting a long time for her to be glad about this. You’re sure there’s nothing else we could use?”

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been to a Gallifreyan wedding,” he admitted. Then his expression changed, and Donna knew he’d found it. “But there was a bit in both ceremonies where you’d have the couple tie their hands together with a bit of cloth. A ribbon, anything would do.”

“That sort of sounds like hand-fasting,” Donna said. “They do it in Ireland mostly. I think it was the Celts that started it. But it’s not uncommon here.”

“Humans do it, too? That is  _ fascinating _ . I wonder how that first got started?”

“We’ll have a look in on the Celts on our honeymoon,” Donna offered. “But, hand-fasting for the wedding. Definitely happening? Is there anything else you want to add?”

“Well, I might. I mean, there were some vows. No one would be able to understand them. I could just translate them to English—”

“What if we got it embroidered into the cord? Or whatever fabric we use to tie our hands together? That way it’s part of the ceremony, in Gallifreyan, and we have it forever.”

“Have I mentioned lately how brilliant you are?” He leaned across the table to kiss her, which she was very nearly tempted to continue even if it meant letting the rest of this go for the day.

The Doctor broke from her lips but left a hand resting on her cheek. “Thank you. Really. It means more to me than I can say. And I promise I will be here and present for all the Earth-based decisions, too. It’s important to me to see your traditions respected just as well as mine.”

“But not the cake one,” she added hastily.

He gave a single shake of the head. “Not the cake one.” He paused for just a single breath, then added, “Although, typical Gallifreyan wedding cakes always had edible ball bearings—”

Donna batted his hand away. “Nice try, Spaceman.”

“Can we  _ please _ get one?”


End file.
